Wednesday, September 30, 2015

The New Ancestry & My Frustration




I have been working on Ancestry, researching for upcoming posts. I am extremely frustrated with some of new things on Ancestry and I am sure my experiences are not at all unusual. If you follow my blog, you know that I very rarely if ever say anything negative. 

My frustration is getting the best of me. Please forgive my ranting!

I can't find my family group sheets any longer, did you take them away? Why when I add a new photo does it go straight to my media gallery and not to the person for whom it belongs? Having to back track to "media gallery central" makes the task twice as long and is ridiculous. And where is the comment section? Are we no longer allowed to leave comments on public trees and media?

You have databases that are available to read but they can not be attached to our profiles of the person to which they apply. Some are extracted records, such as Northern Kentucky Marriages by S. Worrel, while 2 of the new databases for Social Security Applications and Wills and Probates cannot be attached to my ancestor's profile. If you are going to continue adding new databases, which I am all for, please allow us to attach them rather than having to continually search the database for the information.

Ancestry, please give your users the opportunity to attach all available records found in all new, current and old databases rather than not attaching them at all. With the new Ancestry you have added life events into our profiles but we can't remove them! A lot of my ancestor profiles already had these added by me and now I have duplicate entries! Give your users the option of deleting your duplicate information. Oh and why can I no longer leave a comment other than in my own tree? 

This is so frustrating! I choose to use Ancestry and I choose to pay for the All-Access membership is because it gives me access to Newspapers.com and Fold 3.com, both of which are $79.95 per year. While I see that both sites are currently running specials of  $39.95, there is no guarantee that at the end of said subscription, I will get the same rate. 

I don't want to switch over to another online provider because I have been an Ancestry.com member for more years than I can remember right now. However, it is something I may have to consider if you (Ancestry) cannot fix what I consider to be part of the basics on Ancestry. Those basics that allow us to control our media files, allow comments to/from other researchers, allow us to build the life story of our ancestors and not what Ancestry wants it to say.

And now Blogger wants to act up!

Sources:

Subscription plan, Fold3.com (https://www.fold3.com/choose-a-plan/ : 30 September 2015).

Subscription plan, Newspapers.com (http://www.newspapers.com/choose-a-plan/ : 30 September 2015).

4 comments:

  1. Dawn, you certainly are not alone. After 5 years of full access subscription, I let it lapse last month to fish in other ponds till they get a clue at Ancestry.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you, Chris! Did you find a good alternative yet?

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  2. Hi. You can add comments. Click on tools, view comments and at the bottom should be a space to add comments. Just a matter of finding the location. I haven't had a problem adding photos, or the Social Security Applications. Don't know how to help you on those though.

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